And in her own blog post about the RFI, NIH Associate Director for Research on Women’s Health Janine Clayton said that while many scientists have already expressed support for the policy change, she has also heard from many sources that it needs “to be carefully implemented, as a true benefit to science—and not become a trivial, bureaucratic box to check.” She noted that comments in response to the RFI will guide NIH in creating “meaningful change in a deliberate and thoughtful way.”

Since NIGMS supports a significant amount of basic biomedical science that utilizes animal models and cells, we encourage our grantees to submit their input on this topic by the October 13 deadline.

UPDATE: The deadline for submitting input has been extended to October 24.